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I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

alexanderell.is

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Re: I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

#131

Post by izacus »

distances wrote: post #127
izacus wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My rule is: if I get a single notification that I find useless, I'll immediately disable that notification channel (I'm on Android; I'm not sure if iOS has a concept of channel-specific settings) for that app. Even if the channel can include useful notifications, as the article discusses. Well, the developers have started fighting against that by not splitting notifications into channels anymore. Now you just get "…

I usually simply uninstall the app on the first clearly spammy notification. Why wouldn't I? It immediately sours the app image. If it's borderline I will first try silencing the channel like the parent commenter.

Those rules only work until you're required to have such app installed to do, for example, credit card payments.

Re: I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

#132

Post by brk »

My general mindset is that I survived just fine before apps and notifications were a thing. If they provide truly useful information, I'll use them. If they become spammy or start trying to prod me to drive more engagement I'll disable, or delete, whatever is enabling that. If that means I delete the app, and possibly stop using the service altogether, so be it, I'm doing just fine.

Re: I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

#133

Post by SpacePortKnight »

dguo wrote: post #23

My rule is: if I get a single notification that I find useless, I'll immediately disable that notification channel (I'm on Android; I'm not sure if iOS has a concept of channel-specific settings) for that app. Even if the channel can include useful notifications, as the article discusses. If the app doesn't bother to categorize its notifications into channels at all, I turn off its notifications entirely, and I won't…

Lately I've been disabling notifications for almost all apps including Uber and food delivery apps. I can always open up the app to check the status when I want to. The only spam I've left on my phone is now the needless SMS.

Re: I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

#135

Post by kshacker »

fmajid wrote: post #98
grose wrote: post #6

I've noticed this in social networks as well. If you don't get enough transactional notifications for a while they start making up fake ones like Twitter's "in case you missed this Tweet", Facebook's "[someone] posted for the first time in a while", all the while lighting up the notifications badge. Leads to a "boy who cried wolf" scenario in which I stop trusting notifications entirely and just ignore them, possibly…

That's because the social networks employ armies of industrial psychologists with PhDs who figured out that notifications generate a little squirt of dopamine, and are thus addictive, as opioids are just an approximation thereof. That's why they won't give you an option to turn off notifications, just as they won't let you take control of the ordering of your feed, or offer RSS feeds for it. There is literally nothin…

Funny I mentally read "psychopaths" when you said "psychologists" ... my mind was already set while reading the other comments, and something made me go back and re-read your comment to realize the difference :)

Re: I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

#136

Post by Helmut10001 »

lozenge wrote: post #101
TedShiller wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a really interesting strategy. Thanks for the tip. What about emergency calls? But then I just realized, those are extremely uncommon.

https://support.google.com/android/answer/9069335?hl=en-GB#z... > Under 'What can interrupt Do Not Disturb', tap People: Calls: Repeat callers. To let a call through if the same person calls twice in 15 minutes, turn on Allow repeat callers.

Nice, thanks! Maybe that could be a good addition, to catch the one exception in 10 years that really must get through.

Re: I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

#137

Post by fxtentacle »

izacus wrote: post #131
distances wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I usually simply uninstall the app on the first clearly spammy notification. Why wouldn't I? It immediately sours the app image. If it's borderline I will first try silencing the channel like the parent commenter.

Those rules only work until you're required to have such app installed to do, for example, credit card payments.

Where i live, GDPR and related laws make it illegal to mix advertising permissions with functional permissions. So that's never going to happen.

Re: I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

#138

Post by coding123 »

First thing I do with all apps is disable all notifications for that app. The only exception is whatever app my workplace uses (Teams). For that I simply turn the ringer to silent so they can't vibrate the shit out of me. For those they just need to wait for me to look at my phone.

Re: I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

#139

Post by karamanolev »

brk wrote: post #132

My general mindset is that I survived just fine before apps and notifications were a thing. If they provide truly useful information, I'll use them. If they become spammy or start trying to prod me to drive more engagement I'll disable, or delete, whatever is enabling that. If that means I delete the app, and possibly stop using the service altogether, so be it, I'm doing just fine.

Many people here express that kind of sentiment and I find it either irrationally rebellious or just false. We all survived just fine before smartphones, internet, electricity and so on. Does it mean we can just delete and cancel big stuff over small annoyances? We'll end up deleting most of our lives. I don't find marketing notifications somehow more egregious than the million other anti-consumer behaviors companies show. It's a much better approach to fight those in a more targeted fashion, while still using the services and products we like or need.

Please keep in mind that need is almost never "I will not survive (I will die) without it", but rather "My life is so much better with it, that a substantial investment in time/money/energy/suffering of annoyances is worth it".

Re: I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

#140

Post by deergomoo »

rapind wrote: post #22
grose wrote: post #6

I've noticed this in social networks as well. If you don't get enough transactional notifications for a while they start making up fake ones like Twitter's "in case you missed this Tweet", Facebook's "[someone] posted for the first time in a while", all the while lighting up the notifications badge. Leads to a "boy who cried wolf" scenario in which I stop trusting notifications entirely and just ignore them, possibly…

Apple kept a notification badge on my settings icon for Apple Pay until I finally went in and opted out of it. Under the guise of “Finish setting up your iPhone”. It’s not a big deal I guess, but annoying and obviously promotional. Now I partially associate Apple with intentionally annoying.

Apple’s big push into services has been slowly but surely chipping away at the generally pleasant experience of using their platforms. The price of entry was always high, but once you were through the door you were never really upsold.

Not so anymore. Numerous nags in settings to buy AppleCare or start a trial of some service or other. The App Store is particularly egregious: as well as search ads there are now occasional modal prompts to enable marketing notifications with my most hated dark pattern of all—only offering “yes” or “not now” as options.

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